The carbon footprint of the Information Technology (IT) industry, though only 2% of the total economy, is estimated to be equal to that of the entire aviation industry. This large carbon footprint is partly a result of high levels of electricity consumption for data centers within the IT industry. For example, the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) reported that data centers in the U.S. alone in 2006 consumed more than 61 billion kilowatt-hours (kWh) of electricity. This level of energy consumption is equivalent to nearly 5.8 million average households.
IT systems are increasingly being used to address the remaining 98% of the carbon footprint of the total economy. For example, IT systems may provide videoconferencing functionalities that replace the need for travel.